Nineteen-year-old Fauziya Kasinga said she came to the United States in 1994 to seek asylum from a grisly and sometimes deadly practice in her West African homeland of Togo -- the ritual mutilation of female genitals.
The U.S. Board of Immigration Appeals held a hearing May 2, 1996 to consider whether Kasinga should be granted political asylum. The following is a transcript.
On June 13, the board granted asylum to Kasinga. It was the first recognition of genital mutilation as a form of persecution and the basis for asylum.
